Nadezhda Savchenko

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/. Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service on Friday refuted allegations of the lawyer of Ukrainian female pilot Nadezhda Savchenko, who is facing charges of involvement in the killing of two Russian journalists in eastern Ukraine, that she is being deprived of sleep at a forensic institution in Moscow where she is undergoing psychiatric examination.

“No one has deprived Savchenko of sleep. In line with normative documents, at least one staff member is to stay by a suspect in a medical institution round-the-clock,” the Service’s press office said, adding that two female officers were staying by Savchenko.

In early July, Russia’s Investigative Committee charged Savchenko with involvement in the murder of two reporters, who worked for the Russian VGTRK TV corporation in Ukraine.

Russian investigators said Savchenko, who was arrested after illegally entering the Russian territory, joined the Aidar battalion during combat operations near the city of Lugansk in June. Locating the positions of the Russian TV crew and other civilians near Lugansk, she passed them on to the military that opened mortar fire on the group of people, which resulted in the killing of the Russian reporters Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin in mid-June.

On Monday, the Committee said Savchenko had been taken to the Serbsky State Scientific Center for Social and Forensic Psychiatry in Moscow to undergo psychiatric examination.